And said to the woods, as their burdens were borne
With a flutter and sigh to the eaves,
"They are wrinkled and wasted, and tattered and torn,
And we too have our withering leaves."

Did I hear a low echo of footfalls about,
Whilst watching those forest trees stark?
Or was it a dream that I hurried without
To clutch at and grapple the dark?

In the shadow I stood for a moment and spake --
"Bright thing that was loved in the past,
Oh! am I asleep -- or abroad and awake?
And are you so near me at last?

"Oh, roamer from lands where the vanished years go,
Oh, waif from those mystical zones,
Come here where I long for you, broken and low,
On the mosses and watery stones!

"Come out of your silence and tell me if Life
Is so fair in that world as they say;
Was it worth all this yearning, and weeping, and strife
When you left it behind you to-day?

"Will it end all this watching, and doubting, and dread?
Do these sorrows die out with our breath?
Will they pass from our souls like a nightmare," I said,
"While we glide through the mazes of Death?